Ian Pearce, Linkam's International Sales Manager at the Linkam Scientific booth at EMC2012Last week we exhibited our instruments at the 15th European Microscopy Congress, and what a successful show it was. Excited delegate comments of 'It's been non-stop buzz' and 'The best microscopy show I've attended in at least the last 10 years' were not uncommon.

The conference featured some fascinating talks which ran alongside Europe's largest exhibition dedicated to microscopy.

Together these created a festival atmosphere and a truly memorable event.

The conference was set in Manchester Central, a magnificent refurbished train station in the heart of one of the UK’s most exciting cities. With its vaulted arches and iconic clock, the building has been a much-loved feature and an integral part of Manchester for nearly 130 years.

Over 1,600 delegates attended over the course of the week, in addition to several hundred day visitors. Nearly 1,000 exhibitors, on over 100 stands, brought a wide range of exciting and new equipment to view and test. Within eight parallel sessions, there were 450 oral presentations, 84 speakers, and an impressive 750 poster presentations. Altogether it was quite a crowd.

A very crowded conference hall.Dr Debbie Stokes, Chair of the Congress, and Dr Paul Midgley, EMS President, welcomed all delegates and exhibitors on the first day. Together they introduced the plenary Lecturers: Professor Tony Wilson and Professor Peter Dobson. Professor Wilson gave an entertaining and informative talk on 'Making light work' and Professor Dobson provided a thought provoking look at the potential of nanotechnology in the future.

As promised, Linkam had a very special surprise for our first 150 visitors. We hope you enjoyed them.

Tasty cupcakes were given away free on the Linkam stand in celebration of our company's 30th year anniversary. We would like to extend a big thank you to all the organisers for such a fantastic event. We would also like to thank all our visitors who took the time to come and talk to us. We enjoyed meeting you face to face and hearing your stories, questions, thoughts and concerns and look forward to working with you in the future - and maybe delivering a new surprise or two along the way.